A former Los Angeles Rams employee who made a sarcastic remark about Patrick Chung during the Super Bowl is suing the New England Patriots defensive back, claiming he lost his job after the private comment was shared on social media.
Matthew Hogan, a former Rams ticket executive, said in his lawsuit that he was college buddies with Matthew Weymouth, who runs Chung’s social media pages. Hogan and Weymouth exchanged some friendly trash talk leading up to Super Bowl LIII, but things got ugly when Hogan texted Weymouth saying “Patrick Chung is a b—-” after Chung injured his arm and left the game.
According to the lawsuit, which was reviewed by TMZ, Hogan said Weymouth did not appreciate the joke and responded by cursing at him and threatening him. Hogan says one of the things Weymouth wrote to him was “if I see you I’m going to jail and I don’t care.” Weymouth then supposedly shared screenshots of the text messages on Chung’s Instagram and Twitter accounts.
One caption on Chung’s page identified the “Patrick Chung is a b—-” text as having come from a Rams employee and said, “I would never wish or say anything like this to anyone after they just broke their arm. You should be ashamed bro.” Hogan says there was never any indication that his text was sent to Weymouth and not Chung, which he believes constitutes defamation.
Following the incident, Hogan says he was “forced from his job” as a Rams ticket representative and has not been able to find work elsewhere. He is suing Chung, Weymouth and others for $1.75 million.
Chung showed us leading up to the Super Bowl that he is not afraid of a little trash talk, but it sounds like he’s caught in the middle of a dispute among friends in this case.
